GNC vs Vitamin Shoppe?

Between the two, who has better variety & prices? I'm not worried about the staff, as I won't be relying on them for any information, I'm just wondering about the product stock.

I'm just tired of the hassle I have to go through when dealing with UPS for online orders (*I'll put the story below, in cliff format, if anyone wants to read it). Every single time an online order ships through UPS - whether it's supplements, car parts, books or electronics - it never shows up to my house and I then have to spend another week or two chasing it down.

So I'm thinking it might just be worth spending a few extra bucks to pick it up locally. That way it's in my possession immediately and I no longer have to deal with their ignorance.

- Ordered some supps 2 weeks ago
- Shipped it out on the 11th and I got tracking number
- Checked tracking daily, saw they arrived in the area on the 16th
- I put a note on the door the next morning with my signature and the date to request he leave the package
- No package or delivery notice when I got home
- Tracking number says attempt to deliver was made
- Left note again on 18th
- No package or delivery notice when I got home
- Tracking number says attempt to deliver was made
- Cancelled all plans Saturday and spent 8am-7pm working in yard, waiting; only 3 cars came down my road that day, none of which were UPS
- Tracking number says attempt to deliver was made
- Rinse & repeat Monday & Tuesday
- Called UPS Corporate Tuesday evening, they called local office with "Emergency Dispatch"
- No call received Wednesday. No package or delivery notice.
- Checked tracking, package was returned to shipper
- Called UPS Corporate back this morning
- Still dealing with delivery issue

In 2 weeks, the package spent 8 days in the immediate area and not once did they try to deliver it. My accross-the-street neighbor runs video surveillance (he's the top driver in Powerboat Superleague and works on boats at home a lot) and I bet I can go back through those days I wasn't home and verify he never came down our road then, either.

At least for me Vitamin Shoppe has A) Better prices B) Better selection C) A staff I like more

Examples: To me, it seems like my GNC has very little choice for most supplements. My vitamin shoppe has Triad, M-stak, assault, 1mr, bunch of different creatine mono choices, and a lot more protein choices just to name a few things off the top of my head from looking around. I found none of these at GNC.

If I wanted to buy some ON Whey (I actually enjoy the taste), it's $70 for 5lb at GNC or $43 at VS.

When I did buy said whey protein, the staff at VS struck up a conversation about how they enjoyed ON Whey as well and had been using it for a while. When I (very early on in my lifting career) bought some ON at GNC, the worker tried to suggest I buy the GNC Wheybolic crap, which I did not.

from someone who has worked at both and shopped at both Vitamin Shoppe is much better overrall. Selection is far greater and prices are a lot cheaper than GNC. If you find something cheaper on VS website print it out and they will match it in the store for you. Sttuff I know on hand that is cheaper online is ON protein, BSN products (huge savings), USPlabs sometimes and Carlson liquid fish oil is the best deal i've seen anywhere. 21 bucks for 100 servings

Not a huge fan of any of those except Carlson but if you need something and need it right away I would hit up the VS.

In hawaii GNC is way way cheaper than VS. But VS has more selection. GNC has the popular supps. GNC does price match, they just have to call the store to confirm prices. My friend has a supp shop and gets pissed everytime GNC calls for a price quote. So for 1 month he said "It's $1 cause its a fire sale". Funny stuff.

Vitamin shoppe hands down. Much bigger selection and prices are usually better and the staff actually seem to know what they are talking about. I go into GNC a few times a year just to check out the 50% off table.

Anything is better than GNC. Seriously. Unless you hit a website glitch you should not buy from GNC.

Unfortunately shopping online is pretty much always more economical than in a brick and mortar store...unless maybe you are only going to purchase one single product. I can usually do a much better job with a bb.com order than going to vitamin shoppe. I order elsewhere a lot now though. bb.com prices and shipping aren't all that great. Their selection is though.

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